Lenin
Masculine
Lenin is overwhelmingly a boys’ name — 1,722 boys against 5 girls since 1880.
Lenin is a pseudonym that became a surname and then, in a few parts of the world, an ordinary first name. It was chosen rather than inherited, and even the man who chose it left no record of why.
How old is the name Lenin?
Lenin first appears in US birth records in 1925 — 100 years ago. The typical Lenin alive today was born around 2009, making them about 16 years old. About 1,700 people named Lenin are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Lenin most popular?
Lenin peaked in 2018, reaching #1823 nationally. Today it ranks #2884, 1,061 places below that high. See the whole 2018 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
Origin, sound and short forms
The story of Lenin
The pseudonym belonged to the leader of the Russian revolution of 1917, and after his death it spread as a given name wherever his politics did. It has been most durable in two places English-speaking readers might not expect: Latin America, particularly Ecuador and Mexico, where parents on the left gave it freely through the twentieth century, and the Indian state of Kerala, which has had communist governments for decades and where the name is entirely unremarkable. It reaches United States records mostly with families from those places.
Meaningnot established
Not established
The name was adopted as a revolutionary pseudonym and its own derivation was never explained by its bearer. The most repeated suggestion is the river Lena in Siberia, on the pattern of another revolutionary who took a name from the Volga; other accounts have been proposed and none is documented. So the name that a great many children now carry has, strictly speaking, no established meaning at all.
Pronouncing Lenin
LEN-in
Two syllables, stress on the first in English and Russian alike. Spanish speakers often say leh-NEEN with the stress at the end, which the accented Lenín marks.
Nicknames for Lenin
Moderate
What the data says
146 years of official birth records
The long climb, and where it stands now
The same years in position rather than babies
- First recorded
- 1925
- Most boys named
- 201883 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1823reached in 2018
- Change vs 2024
- −4.4%43 in 2025, from 45
Rank is a position, a count is a headcount, and they move independently — a name can hold its rank while the number of babies behind it falls. Source: U.S. Social Security Administration.
Lenin in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Ленин in Russian — transliteration
- Lenín in Spanish — spelling variant
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas, Illinois.
Lenins among us
people named Lenin are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 39,723 born in 2025 was named Lenin
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Lenin
- #2884
- Lenin on the 2025 chart
- #871
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Lenin went to 43 boys in 2025, but Lennin and Lennyn are the same name said out loud. Together the 3 spellings went to 57, which makes it the 871st most-given boys’ name of the year — 2,013 places above the chart.
- Lenin43
- Lennin8
- Lennyn6
About 1 boy in 29,966 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 39,723 for Lenin itself.
Spellings are grouped by a fixed rule that folds interchangeable English spellings of one sound (ck/k, ph/f, x/ks, a non-initial y for i) and keeps vowels apart, so Sean and Shawn stay separate names. It errs towards splitting: a family here is never larger than the truth. SSA national data, 2025. Method
Is it right for you
What happens to a name after it peaks
The Daris test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Lenin's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Daris climbed just as high around 1961, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Daris's path sketches the road Lenin is walking now.
Lenin sits in the calm middle of the cycle — neither chasing a wave nor sliding off one. Middle-of-the-cycle names age slowly and predictably.
A scored estimate from 146 years of naming cycles — not a prophecy. Great names outlive statistics. How this is scored
Where Lenin is headed
Lenin is easing off slowly — about 19% fewer babies a year by 2030 if the trend continues. Its history is short or jumpy, though, so read this as a sketch rather than a promise.
Low confidence — fitted on official counts through 2025.
A damped-trend projection of the official birth data — a sketch of momentum, not a promise. Every name's forecast, ranked.
Lenin beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Lenin in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Five letters, two syllables, and said correctly by everyone at first sight.
- Len is a ready short form with a long independent record.
- Genuinely ordinary in Ecuador, Mexico and Kerala rather than an experiment.
- It is unmistakably a political name and will be read as a statement everywhere in the United States.
- The historical figure it honors is judged very differently in different countries and households.
- It has no documented meaning of its own, since it began as an invented pseudonym.
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What they receive
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Lenin
Masculine · #2884 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Lenins are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 1,700 people named Lenin are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Lenin?
- Lenin is the most-used spelling in US records — 43 of the 57 babies given the name in 2025. The others recorded are Lennin and Lennyn.
- How popular is the name Lenin in 2025?
- Lenin ranks #2884 among US boy names in 2025, with 43 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Lenin?
- About 1 in every 39,723 US boys born in 2025 was named Lenin — 43 in all.
- Will my child share the name Lenin with classmates?
- Lenin will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Lenin
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Kamal#2884 · Blu#2884 · Rafi#2884 · Minh#2884 · Shaquille#2884 · Arnav#2884 · Jayven#2884 · Hiro#2884
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Lenin? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Lenin and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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